Evil - the Drama of Human Freedom As Seen By Hans Urs Von Balthasar

Jakub Szwarczyński

Abstract

The existence of evil in the world is one of the fundamental issues for which humans are still looking for an answer. Hans Urs von Balthasar
finds it in the possibility of human freedom. What was supposed to be the greatest gift for humans – to be free, relational, created in the image and likeness of the first relation – becomes a curse for them when they try to overcome a difference that exists between them and the Creator. In this way, humans admits absoluteness to their freedom. In order to decide on the good, they eventually fall into a lie that separates them from God. The drama is turned into tragedy. It solution Balthasar finds in soteriology. God allows humans to have their choices even if they are choices of evil, because He takes responsibility for human actions. When in Jesus Christ, entering the scene of theodrama He shows human the right way to play their role. Simultaneously by the power of the union of two freedoms, He overcomes the formed distance, redeeming humans from evil, in which they fell.